In a world where premium brands and pharmaceuticals, such as vaccines and biologics, command pricing premiums, there is an incentive to engage in various types counterfeiting. Counterfeiting and forgery have become significant concerns in the modern economy and marketplace both for reasons of economic loss as well as health and safety of consumers and the populations served by suppliers. Advances in digital technology, three dimensional printing, and access to various types of micro fabrication facilities have increased the incidence of counterfeited objects and gray market activities, primarily through imitation of security products used on secondary packaging such as boxes.
Retailers, consumers, and manufacturers all rely on the ability to detect counterfeit goods to protect individuals and themselves from economic harm, brand dilution, and other risks associated with counterfeit goods of dubious quality and materials. Common fraudulent activities include counterfeiting goods or reselling diverted merchandise through large scale well organized operations as well as on the Internet.
Similarly, the ability to track an object throughout the world becomes increasingly challenging as markets open up all around the globe with different warehousing arrangements, transportation steps, and distribution schemes.
Accordingly, what is needed are methods which produce codes and markings which are embodied on the primary container or the object itself. These codes and markings are useful for determining whether an object is authentic, for tracking the object through a transportation and distribution chain, for determining whether it was sold by the authorized retailer or their channel partner, and for tracking where the object is within various environments, and doing so from any point in the world.